Tuesday, February 21, 2006

Well, I think I finally have a better appreciation of tilt. The first hand I play of the night is AKs. Several limpers so I throw T100 at the pot to see what happens (blinds are only 10/20) and I get one caller. Flop comes AQXr (only one to my suit) and I go to buy the pot with T200, and original caller calls once more. Turn is another Q, so I try to buy again with my T200 and he calls again. River is a Q, so now I have my boat and I go T500. He pushes all-in with T1000. Having never played this person before, I take a quick look at my stack and I would still have 1000 after I make the call, so I take him up on his offer assuming at best he has the X, at worst we split the pot. I was astounded when he flipped over a Q3o!

Now I can fully understand his call on the Turn and his all-in on the River, but the 5x BB call with a Q3o and his 10x BB with a pair of Q’s and playing the board just had me mired in confusion, put me on tilt and throwing a donkey label on him. As it turns out, the rest of the table labeled him as such too and before an hour had passed, he quite generously distributed all of my chips and his chips around the table.

Sadly enough, that hand stayed with me all night and kept me off my game. Didn’t really last much past the three hour mark., oh well, what can you do. Perhaps tonight I’ll do better in the WWdN Invitational #16 (at least I think it’s #16).

Monday, February 20, 2006

I really need to keep this thing up-to-date more often, perhaps I may even start this week!

Anyhow, several weeks ago at the WWdN Invitational I actually placed 5th! It was a nice large field so the final two tables paid and I received a nice little $80 boost to my PokerStars account. As for the live games, it’s been a pretty dry month for me, at least with the Official Tourney, but the side games have been doing right by me. The side games are usually just single table Sit and Go style with 2nd getting their buy-in back and winner taking the rest. Yesterday, however, was something special.

When we showed up for the regularly scheduled 3:30 PM game, the turnout was quite light so they ended up canceling the tourney. For those interested, there was a spontaneous ‘fun-game’ generated at a different location. We ended up with a 3 table Sit and Go and top 4 got compensated. Fourth got their buy-in back, and I ended up in third after my turned boat (was actually all-in on the flop with two pair) lost to a rivered larger boat (he had a pair on the flop). Me and my T1,500 went all-in blind on the next hand (blinds were 500/1,000) and failed to pull anything out.

After that we all headed on over to the 8 PM Official Tourney game. I actually did quite well there. Did a wonderful slow play on one hand and damn near crippled the big stack. Had JTo in the BB and checked it around. Flop came KQ5 and I checked, someone bet T800 (blinds were 100/200) and I called (two folds). Turn gave me my A and my straight, so I checked anticipating another T800 bet that I could then check-raise, I was not disappointed. After he bet his T800 I went up to T4,000 and was pleasantly surprised when he called. River gave me a 9, so I had an A-9 straight, so I went all-in with my remaining T1,400 and he called. He threw down his “K9, two pair!” and then I showed my JT. He was crushed, he thought I was trying to buy the pot with my check-raise. It’s very rare for me to check-raise, so I guess I confused him enough to encourage many a call. Later on I kept chipping away at him by betting just enough to keep him going with a weak/drawing hands (and fortunately he kept missing his draws).

Then the clock struck 11 PM. I have no idea why, but once that happened my body shifted into ‘sudden sleep mode.’ I could barely keep my eyes open and actually found myself having to think if it was a good move to call a raise and re-raise with an A6o. At that point I pretty much knew I was done for the night and if I didn’t get a big pot soon there would be no way for me to make it to the final table (there were four still running). I looked down at pocket 6’s and made it T6,000 to go (blinds were 500/1,000). I got caller #1 and then caller # 2 went all-in for T2,000 more. After that, I called and went all-in with my remaining T1,500 and caller #1 covered me. Caller #1 flipped up pocket A’s and caller #2 flipped up ATs. Yeah when I caught a 6 on the flop and saddened by an A on the river.

Oh well, after that I went up to the girlfriend (who had about T30,000 in chips) and told her I was off to bed. She said she was jealous and all she wanted was a bacon cheeseburger and bed. I guess she was successful in donking off her chips as she came up to bed less than an hour later.